Page 19 - Priorities #47 2010-June/July

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Keeping Priory thriving
When Wayne Davison became Chair of the Board in 1999, Priory was just emerging from a tough period. “We were in a time of building up the enrollment and the reputation of the school was coming along,” Davison says. As Chair, he led an effort to dramatically increase teacher pay and set in motion the school’s largest fundraising effort ever, the Golden Jubilee campaign. Davison says, “The school hadn’t done a capital campaign before. So going out and having a campaign that would go over a period of 5 years and raise 25 million dollars was, hmm, something new and different!”
Ray Rothrock adds, “Before, fundraising was two people on the phones occasionally. We’re five hundred feet off the road, and there had always been this introverted sense—we do it all ourselves. But we couldn’t do 25 million by ourselves. It was a real head-shift for everyone, the staff, the monks, the culture, the board.”
Wayne agrees, “There was a real sea change. Now we worry about keeping enrollment in check!”
When Ray Rothrock took over as Board Chair in 2002, the Golden Jubilee campaign was in full swing. “We had a strategic plan, we had a master plan, we had done all that campus planning, but we had the simultaneous tasks of raising the money to execute it and getting the permits passed by the town, which was no minor feat. And to build it, on plan and on schedule, as best we could, at a time when the market was absolute nuclear winter. So there was a lot of cheerleading and a lot of strategic thinking.”
In 2007, by the time the PAC was completed, Peter Campagna was Board Chair. “I was honored to be there for the first assembly in the new building. It was thrilling to see how excited the community was by the new space, and to see how the hard work of so many board members, past board chairs, and donors had paid off in such an amazing way.”
For current Board Chair, Rick Magnuson, the goal has been to keep things running smoothly in the face of the economic downturn. “I contrast all the fireworks that happened over the previous ten years to my stepping into the role as Chair and then the whole financial crisis happening. We can’t stand still at the Priory. The competition keeps investing, we need to keep investing. But for the past two years, it’s been, just keep things steady.”
Keeping Benedictine values strong
The role of the Board of Trustees is not just to ensure the financial health of the school but also to support the Priory’s unique identity as a Benedictine institution. Rothrock remembers when then-chair Davison led the board in a look back at Benedictine history. “This was important because the board had never really thought about it that much,” Rothrock admitted. With the monastic community gradually decreasing in number, they knew a critical transition for the
school would be to figure out how to take the Benedictine values and carry them forward as a community. Soon after, the board’s Mission Committee came into being.
With the help of that committee and the school-wide discussions that ensued, Davison observes, “the school as a whole started thinking of itself as Benedictine, in a sense that it hadn’t before.”
Peter Campagna recalls a meeting with parents, students, faculty and the Board of Trustees when the issue of the monastery’s declining numbers came up. “A member of the faculty asked would the Board of Trustees ‘own’ the school when all the monks were gone. My immediate response was that the key issue is ownership of the goals and ideals of the Priory, and that everyone in the room and connected with the school carried that responsibility.” His answer, he says, came directly from what he had learned from serving on the Board: “We are all responsible for carrying on the Benedictine traditions that have made the Priory what it is today.”
Looking ahead
The Priory has made great strides in the past ten years. All four Board Chairs revel in the school’s increased reputation, strong academic program, and good financial health. Still, there are challenges ahead. In Father William’s words, “What’s really going to make or break the future is the ability to amass some type of endowment. It’s really a tight squeeze, especially when you get into an economic slump like we’re in now. You can only raise tuition to a certain extent, and yet if you don’t do that, there are problems of justice about what happens with the people working for the school.”
Wayne Davison concurs. “The endowment is about ten times what it was when I started, but it’s maybe twenty percent of what we need. That would provide a ballast and a staying power for the school to handle some of the ups and downs.”
Peter Campagna says, “I hope that the Priory can continue to serve its mission well into the 21st century. Recently, the school has a more visible emphasis on environmental sustainability. But the Priory is part of the 1500 year Benedictine tradition – talk about sustaining! In everything we do, our focus should be on the long-term impact of those actions.”
When he visits Priory now from St. Anselm College in New Hampshire, Father William loves to see how the school has sustained itself—and grown—since his arrival here twenty-five years ago. “When I came, we were probably at the bottom of our history. There were, I think, only 75 or 80 students. There was a financial deficit, and without the board, we wouldn’t have been able to solve that. And now, to see where the school is at is just thrilling to me. I’m just amazed when I see the things that the kids are doing in the Performing Arts Center, and in their other classes. It’s just phenomenal!”